Posted By Tom Kensler On October 24, 2013 @ 8:46 am In College Sports,Colorado State University,Football,Mountain West Conference | 1 Comment

Colorado State coach Jim McElwain. (AAron Ontiveroz, The Denver Post)

FORT COLLINS — Early in the week, Colorado State football coach Jim McElwain had already impressed upon his team that it would be a mistake to use the travel to Hawaii and Saturday night’s 10 o’clock kickoff (Mountain Time) in Aloha Stadium as excuses.

“The travel — you can use it as an excuse to maybe not play to your fullest,” McElwain said. “How we handle it will be part of the growing experience and see if we’re mentally capable of taking the distractions and understanding what business trip we’re going on here.”

Hawaii is four time zones later than Colorado. Kickoff locally in Honolulu will be 6 p.m. To the body clocks of CSU players, that could feel like 10 p.m.

“One of the things we did this summer — our guys worked out at 11 o’clock at night,” McElwain said. “The game is going to start at 10 o’clock (Mountain Time). Heck, some of them don’t start playing (the video game) ‘Call of Duty’ until midnight anyway.

“And yet, I’m not going to downplay the fact that some of our guys have never been to Hawaii,” he added.

It’s customary for teams to travel to Hawaii on Thursday for a Saturday game. CSU is going in on Friday to adhere to the Rams’ usual routines for away games.

“When you make a big deal about being in an airplane for seven hours, so what?” McElwain said.

McElwain has asked strength-and-conditioning coach Mike Kent to get players, by position groups, to move around in the aisle every 45 minutes.

Article printed from The Field House: http://blogs.denverpost.com/colleges